"look at her! disgusting," the blonde boy pointed at her, her face, her body, all of her. everyone else laughed while she tried to bury her face behind a textbook.
"ah stop it seungkwan, you're making her sad!" the girl with ashy grey hair laughed and hit his arm playfully.
seungkwan walked towards her and snatched her textbook away from her, her rosy cheeks were stained with tears.
"why are you crying? do you feel sorry for yourself? you should be honoured to be noticed by me, boo seungkwan!" he ripped a page off her textbook. "i'll be keeping this, thanks glasses girl!"
she was ten, he was ten, she wasn't popular, yet he was.
***
"wendy, don't you think i'm going a little too far?" he asked the girl who taught him to way to 'attract' his crush.
"of course not, why would you think so?" wendy laughed and brushed her flawless grey hair with her fingers.
"but you said she'd be happy in no time," he asked her, scratching his head innocently.
"maybe it's because you weren't being cruel enough!" wendy scolded.
"what else should i do?" seungkwan groaned and mess up his hair. "she seemed to be hating me more!"
"trust me, as long as you listen to me. i promise she'll fall for you in no time," wendy winked at him.
he believed her.
***
"what the hell is this? are you doing a self-portrait?" he picked up her artwork, raising it above him and stood on tippy-toes. the class turn to him and laughed as soon as they saw it.
the topic this time was a puppy. there was no doubt that she was indeed bad at art. the painting wasn't decent to look at, but she tried and did the best she could do, for no other reason but to make her feel better about her useless self.
her useless self that couldn't even protect her dignity.
"give it back," she said in almost a whisper, but her small voice was overpowered but everyone else's laughers.
"give it back," she said it a little louder, enough for seungkwan to hear.
"excuse me?" he asked, holding up a hand to stop the class from laughing. "say it again," he smirked.
"give my painting back," she spoke clearly. it was the first time she had spoken in front of this many people, but she was no longer afraid.
she wanted to do something that would make herself proud one last time.
"what if i said no?" he challenged. her grip tightened around the paintbrush she was holding.
"i said give it back!" she yelled, startling everyone including the ones who didn't care.
she threw the paintbrush at him, the brown paint smeared on his white school shirt, causing him to drop the painting. she immediately grabbed it and ran out of the classroom and didn't stop.
she continued to run out of the school, unpinning her name tag from her sweater and throwing it away. if only she never existed... or if only she was a bit more pretty, a bit more confident, a bit more skinny. if it was true, things would be different.
she paid no attention to the traffic lights until she heard the horn that was surely approaching her, instead of running away, she stood still.
the car was the only tool that could end her suffering.
***
seungkwan opened his primary school year book that he carried almost everywhere with him and flipped to the page that he had been avoiding to look at.
in between the pages was her name tag from years and years ago, when he ran after her that day and found it lying around on the ground.
he scanned through hundreds of student before he finally found the one and only student without a school photo, which wasn't hard.
name: kim yeri
class: class B
dream: i want to be happy
it was her dream to be happy, yet he couldn't even make her smile. at first he believed it was all wendy's fault for brainwashing him, but it wasn't. he could only blame himself for pushing her to her limits in the past.
---
a/n: does anyone read author's note lol??? h o w are there still people reading this i don't understand omf but thank you guys again! and happy 600+ reads and 100+ votes! it's a blessing to have such nice people like you all. and i've decided to change the name of the story to 'trust'! rip best quality :'))) oh and the parts in italics (almost the entire chapter lol) are flashbacks i guess.
AND THIS CHAPTER is dedicated to jennixtae because she's my twinhoe who's born exactly one day before me and i love her. damn this is one long note
